Funny little stuff

In visiting any culture there are big things to adjust to as well as small, even funny differences. For instance, we have never forgotten how weird it was to us that in England we ate potato chips in flavors like "prawn" and "roasted chicken." As I recall, they tasted like potato chips.

A trip to the grocery store here reveals several such differences.

Products in bags. Many things come in bags here that don't usually in the States. We can by in a bag: vegetable oil, mustard, milk, tomato paste, refried beans, mayonnaise, and many other products. I don't know whether it is more environmentally friendly or not but it is interesting. The oil and mayonnaise bags actually have a screw top at one corner for easy open and close.

Customer service. I've commented on this before. It is up and down. In some ways it is better, others worse. We think it is funny, yet helpful, that just as you enter the produce section of the grocery story there is an employee with a basket of plastic produce bags already taken off the roll and peeled open. I've long fought with those crazy bags but never thought it was worthy of a minimum wage worker to help me with them.

Eggs. Here the eggs are not refrigerated and come in multiples of 5 rather than dozens. So we buy 15 eggs at a time. (I also find it silly that the brand name Debbie usually gets is "Mister Huevo". Not "Señor Huevo" but "Mister").

Dish soap. While you can (and we do) buy liquid dish soap, the more common form of the product here is a tub of hardened soap (the texture reminds me of Lava soap) that one uses by rubbing it with a sponge and then applying to the dishes. This method uses less water, a valuable commodity during the dry season.

This list could go on, I suppose, but this is enough to make the point that there are many little things that make us say, "Huh. Hadn't thought of doing it that way before!"